Cabinet Office

Foreign Investment in UK: Exports

Viscount Waverley: To ask His Majesty's Government what percentage of UK exports derive from inward investment into the UK.

Baroness Neville-Rolfe: The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority.A holding response to the Noble Peer’s Parliamentary Question of 25th April is attached in the answer. The Rt Hon. the Viscount WaverleyHouse of LordsLondonSW1A 0PW11 May 2023Dear Lord Waverley,As National Statistician and Chief Executive of the UK Statistics Authority, I am responding to your Parliamentary Question asking what percentage of UK exports derive from inwarde investment into the UK (HL7457). Statisticians at the Office for National Statistics are currently undertaking additional analysis to answer your question and will place a copy in the House of Lords Library as soon as it is complete.Yours sincerely,Professor Sir Ian DiamondUK Statistics Authority  (pdf, 105.8KB)

Government Departments: Freedom of Information

Baroness Deech: To ask His Majesty's Government how the costs ofresponding to freedom of information requests involving the disclosure of emails are calculated; and when the limit of £600, beyond which cost the request can be refused, was last uprated.

Baroness Neville-Rolfe: Section 12 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 allows public authorities to refuse to deal with any requests where they estimate that responding to the request would exceed the “appropriate limit”, known as the “cost limit”. If a public authority calculates that responding to a request will take it over the appropriate limit it is not obliged to provide a substantive response. The cost limit is calculated at a flat rate of £25 per hour and since 2004 has been set at £600 for central government departments and £450 for other public authorities. Public authorities can only include certain activities when estimating whether responding to a request would breach the cost limit. These are: establishing whether information is held; locating and retrieving information; and extracting relevant information from the document containing it.

Home Office

Frontier Workers: Ferries

Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick: To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the allocation and use of Frontier Worker permits for crews on freight ferries between (1) Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and (2) Great Britain and Ireland.

Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick: To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of allocation and use of Frontier Worker permits on the deployment of crews from the EU and European Economic Area on ferry routes between (1) Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and (2) Great Britain and Ireland.

Lord Murray of Blidworth: The Home Office publishes data on entry clearance visas in the ‘Immigration Statistics Quarterly Release’.Data on the number of applications for the Frontier Worker permit, broken down by nationality, are published in table Vis_D01 of the entry clearance visa applications and outcomes detailed dataset. Data for the Frontier Worker permit can be selected using the ‘Frontier Worker’ visa type subgroup.Data relating to the country of residence or employment type for Frontier Worker permits is not available.table Vis_D01 (xlsx, 1459.3KB)

Computer Misuse Act 1990

Lord Clement-Jones: To ask His Majesty's Government what is their timetable for the next stages of review and potential reform of the Computer Misuse Act 1990 to ensure better legal protections for cyber security professionals.

Lord Sharpe of Epsom: The Home Office concluded its public consultation and response to the Call for Information on the Computer Misuse Act on 6th April 2023.As we set out in the consultation, the question of legal protections is a complex issue, and requires significant further discussion with a wide range of stakeholders. We have committed to work with law enforcement agencies, prosecutors, the cybersecurity industry and system owners to consider proposals, and reach a consensus on the best way forward. This work is under way, and we will provide an update to Parliament in due course.

Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office

Sudan: Armed Conflict

Lord Alton of Liverpool: To ask His Majesty's Government what diplomatic steps they are takingto reduce the risk of regional contagion from the conflict in Sudan.

Lord Alton of Liverpool: To ask His Majesty's Government what estimate they have made of the numbers ofrefugees fleeing Sudan into neighbouring countries; and what steps they are taking to support them.

Lord Alton of Liverpool: To ask His Majesty's Government what estimate they have made, in conjunction with (1) the World Food Programme and (2) the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, of the number of people displaced or affected by the conflict in Sudan and likely to be at risk of hunger or war crimes; and whether they intend to raise the situation in Sudan at the UN Security Council.

Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park: Displacement across international borders during this crisis continues to rise - Chad (20,000), Egypt (11,000), South Sudan (4,000 South Sudanese returnees registered), Ethiopia (4,000 estimated) and CAR (700 people) [last updated 27 April]. UNHCR has declared a Level 1 Emergency for Chad, Ethiopia, South Sudan and Sudan. Humanitarian needs in the region will increase with this mass displacement.We will coordinate with the international humanitarian system (including INGOs, UN agencies, Civil Society Organisations) to support the UN response. The UK will support a well-coordinated and prioritised regional response.

Abdullah Öcalan

Lord Hylton: To ask His Majesty's Government whether they will call on the Council of Europe’s Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishmentto publish itsfindings regarding the solitary confinement of Mr Abdullah Öcalan in İmralı Prisonarisingfromthe Committee'svisit to the prison during its visit to Turkey from 20 to 29 September 2022; and if not, why.

Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon: It is for State Parties to the Council of Europe Convention for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment to authorise publication of reports from the Committee on the Prevention of torture (the Committee). The UK hopes that Turkey, in line with its good practice of usually allowing publication, permits the Committee to publish the report of its September 2022 visit.

Turkey: Elections

Lord Hylton: To ask His Majesty's Government whether they will sponsor independent observers of the elections in May in Turkey; and if so, whether this will be under the auspices of the Council of Europe or the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe.

Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon: We are monitoring the run-up to the 2023 presidential and parliamentary elections in Turkey on May 14 and are in regular discussion with the Turkish electoral authorities, the government, opposition parties and civil society groups. We have stressed the need for the elections to be carried out in a free and fair manner and will continue our dialogue with Turkey throughout the process. Following an invitation from the Turkish authorities and in accordance with its mandate, the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights is deploying an Election Observation Mission to the 14 May 2023 general elections. We have no plans to sponsor independent observers.

Sudan: British Nationals Abroad

Lord Alton of Liverpool: To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking tocommunicate with British citizens in Sudan in the absence of internet and power for mobile phones.

Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park: Communication with British nationals in Sudan remains a significant challenge as the mobile phone network and the internet is inconsistent and often down but so far around 3,400 British nationals have registered their presence with the Foreign Office Crisis Hub. We have used multiple channels, including telephone calls, SMS messaging, and cascading information through organically created WhatsApp and Facebook groups that existed before the conflict. We have also regularly and promptly updated our travel advice on the FCDO website.

Ministry of Defence

Piracy

The Lord Bishop of St Albans: To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of their ability to combat piracyonce fully automated ships have been brought into service, and of howfully automated ships and their cargocan be protected from illegal boarding in the absence of a crew.

Baroness Goldie: The Royal Navy (RN) is developing its plans to bring minimally crewed and uncrewed boats and ships into service. The reduction and removal of crew from boats and ships may bring new challenges, including dealing with illegal boarding. Identification of all of these challenges, and solutions to overcome these are ongoing. These will be in place before the RN deploys minimally crewed and uncrewed boats and ships into service.

Fisheries: North Sea

Baroness McIntosh of Pickering: To ask His Majesty's Government what plans they have to useOverseas Patrol Squadronvessels to monitor hostile activity in the UK's fisheries and against vulnerable undersea assets inregions such as the North Sea.

Baroness Goldie: The Ministry of Defence constantly monitors activity within UK waters and its Economic Exclusion Zone to counter and deter detected threats. The Royal Navy's Batch 1 Offshore Patrol Vessels, of the Overseas Patrol Squadron, are frequently used on a high readiness basis in UK waters to undertake domestic security tasks, including escorting foreign warships through UK waters. This is in addition to the Fleet Ready Escort and other persistently available Royal Navy platforms. The Government takes the security and resilience of undersea infrastructure, including cables, interconnectors, and pipelines, very seriously. These are critical to our national infrastructure, and we monitor the full range of threats and risks.

Department of Health and Social Care

Motor Neurone Disease: Research

Baroness Hodgson of Abinger: To ask His Majesty's Government how much of the £50 million ringfenced for research into Motor Neurone Disease in 2021 has been allocated; and what assessmentthey have made of progress in treating the disease.

Lord Markham: On 12 December 2022, the Government announced how the £50 million of committed funds for motor neurone disease (MND) research would be allocated over the next five years ending March 2027. As such, £29.5 million of Government funding has been allocated through specialist research centres and partnerships with leading researchers. The remainder, at least £20.5 million, is available via a National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) and Medical Research Council rolling call for MND research supported by a joint Highlight Notice. The £29.5 million package includes: £8 million to early phase clinical research for MND via the NIHR Biomedical Research Centres; £2 million to the MND Collaborative Partnership, for the research community to coordinate efforts, adding £1 million already contributed by government; £12.5 million to MND research in the UK Dementia Research Institute, where seven of its fifty research programmes are focused on MND; and £6 million for a translational accelerator which will connect UK Research and Innovation, the MND collaborative partnership, and the UK Dementias Platform.

Rare Diseases: Diagnosis

Baroness Merron: To ask His Majesty's Government, with reference to the England Rare Diseases Action Plan 2023, whether they will publish an update on progress relating to the action to measure the time to diagnosis for both genetic and non-genetic rare conditions; how engagement will be carried out with the patient community once researchers are selected; and when this work will be finalised.

Lord Markham: The National Institute for Health and Care Research works with the public to ensure there are opportunities to participate in research and that their perspectives and experiences help to shape research. Commissioning research, under action 17 of the England Rare Diseases Action Plan 2023 to measure the time to diagnosis, is currently in progress through an open competitive process. Announcements on the process for engagement with the patient community will be made once this process has been completed, and contracts agreed with successful bidders for the research.

Rare Diseases: Medical Treatments

Baroness Merron: To ask His Majesty's Government, with reference to the England Rare Diseases Action Plan 2022, whether NHS England still plans to assess and publish a report on levels of uptake of rare disease treatments, in addition to the highly specialised services annual report.

Lord Markham: NHS England’s specialised commissioning team has assessed the levels of uptake of rare disease treatments and presented the results to the last meeting of the NHS England Rare Diseases Advisory Group in April 2023. NHS England currently have no plans to publish the report.

Rare Cancers: Health Services

Baroness Merron: To ask His Majesty's Government whether rare cancers will be included in the scope of the Major Conditions Strategy.

Lord Markham: The Major Conditions Strategy will look at the treatment and prevention of cancer in people of all ages, covering the patient pathway. The Strategy will look at a wide range of interventions and enablers to improve outcomes and experience for cancer patients. This Strategy will draw on previous work on cancer, including over 5,000 submissions provided to the Department as part of our Call for Evidence last year.  We will continue to work closely with stakeholders, citizens, and the National Health Service in coming weeks to identify actions for the Strategy that will have the most impact.

NHS: Staff

Baroness Wheeler: To ask His Majesty's Government how many full-time equivalent NHS England staff were transferred from specialised commissioning to the monkeypox response workstreams.

Lord Markham: This information is not held in the format requested. It is not possible to quantify the time spent by the NHS England specialised commissioning team in responding to the mpox outbreak. Staff made various contributions during the course of the outbreak, which varied as the patient numbers increased.

NHS: Procurement

Lord Hunt of Kings Heath: To ask His Majesty's Government whatis meantby the term "value-based procurement" in the context of NHS Supply Chain; whether it is their policy that such a value-based procurement approach applies to medical devices and similar product procurements by the NHS;and what steps they are taking to promote the widespread adoption of this approach to procurement of medical devices and similar products.

Lord Markham: Value-based procurement (VBP) is a procurement approach that delivers a reduction in the whole life costs of healthcare where value can be created from financial, efficiency, patient, and environmental benefits. In May 2019, NHS Supply Chain launched a project to consider the potential benefits and practical application of VBP. This involved a series of pilot projects to test the concept of VBP in practice, with a view to producing a scalable model for potential wider deployment. An internal toolkit for the use of Category Tower Service Providers was produced as an output of the VBP project. It is designed to be flexibly applied to the varying product ranges procured through NHS Supply Chain. Central to the guide has been the creation of two models: one can be applied to the renewal of existing frameworks/contracts for product ranges, the other for the procurement of innovation. Activity will be delivered across a wide range of categories including cardiology, orthopaedics, sterile intervention equipment and ward-based consumables. The Government's new Medical Technology Strategy, published in February 2023, commits to developing an environment that supports the understanding and delivery of value for money and affordability across the whole patient pathway, using high quality data to ensure that prices are both reasonable for the health system and sustainable for suppliers. The application and adoption of VBP in the National Health Service is a key priority under the strategy to realise the potential of medical technology to improve patient outcomes and support the NHS workforce. The Department’s Medical Technology Directorate is working closely with NHS Supply Chain and NHS England to build on the work already undertaken to ensure that a consistent methodology is now developed and adopted at both a national and local level.

Health Services: Older People

Baroness Hodgson of Abinger: To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of their levels of preparedness for the predicted increase in the older population.

Lord Markham: There have been changes in the trends of ill health among older people. For example, we know that it is becoming more common for people to spend their later years with multiple health conditions. The percentage of people aged over 65 years old with two or more health conditions is projected to increase from 54% in 2015 to 68% in 2035. We can reduce the risk of developing conditions by adopting healthier behaviours throughout the course of life, and evidence shows that the earlier in life we make healthy changes, the more we reduce the risk of conditions in later life. We are focusing on the major conditions which contribute to early mortality and reduce years of good health, and the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities is taking targeted actions to tackle the most common preventable diseases, improving access and uptake of prevention services, and embedding prevention across health and care. We are delivering an ambitious programme of work to create a healthier environment to help people achieve and maintain a healthy weight and supporting the recovery and modernisation of the NHS Health Check programme to detect and manage conditions early. Furthermore, the Government announced on 24 January 2023 that it will publish a Major Conditions Strategy, which will set out a strong and coherent policy agenda that sets out a shift to integrated, whole-person care. An interim report will be published in the summer.

Motor Neurone Disease: Research

Baroness Hodgson of Abinger: To ask His Majesty's Government how many roundtables have been hosted by the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care with researchers and patient groups to discuss research on Motor Neurone Disease since 2021; and what plans they have to host future roundtables with these groups.

Lord Markham: The Department has hosted two roundtables to discuss research on motor neurone disease (MND) since 2021. A roundtable was held in April 2021 to discuss the Government’s role in funding targeted research into MND. It was attended by the Minister of State for Social Care (Helen Whately MP) and was hosted by the National Institute for Health and Care Research Sheffield Biomedical Research Centre on behalf of the Department and a coalition of United Kingdom MND charities and researchers. A second roundtable was hosted by the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care in February 2023 and explored the path towards treatments for MND, bringing together a number of Ministers, people with lived experience of the disease, charities, researchers, funders and policy makers. The Department does not have any current plans to host future roundtables but is working on a range of activities to progress research into MND as part of the £50 million commitment for research into the disease.

Treasury

Plastics: Taxation

Lord Taylor of Warwick: To ask His Majesty's Government what plans they have to reform thePlastic Packaging Tax to encourage investment in chemical recycling.

Baroness Penn: The government announced it will consult on allowing a mass balance approach for calculating the proportion of recycled content in chemically recycled plastics, for the purposes of the Plastic Packaging Tax. This demonstrates the government’s commitment to developing the tax to ensure it supports the commercialisation of the UK chemical recycling sector whilst continuing to encourage manufacturers and importers to use more recycled plastic in packaging. The consultation will be published later this year.

Public Expenditure: Northern Ireland

Lord Weir of Ballyholme: To ask His Majesty's Government what is thepercentage increase in (1) revenue budget, and (2) capital budget, for Northern Ireland for 2023/24 compared to the percentage increases for government spending for England in each of those categories.

Baroness Penn: In the absence of an Executive, the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland set the Northern Ireland Budget for 2023-24. The Written Ministerial Statement laid on 27 April sets out in detail the budget allocations for Northern Ireland departments, including both resource and capital allocations. UK Government departmental spending plans are not split between spending for England and spending for the rest of the UK. The Northern Ireland Fiscal Council does, however, produce estimates as part of their assessment of the Northern Ireland Budget. Funding for the Northern Ireland Executive is around 20 per cent higher per person than equivalent UK Government spending in other parts of the UK.

Ministry of Justice

Prisoners

Lord Hylton: To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to plan for the projected increase of 10,000 inmates in the prison population by March 2025.

Lord Bellamy: As our public forecast sets out, we expect the prison population to rise over the coming years. We are implementing a suite of measures to ensure we have sufficient prison capacity both in the immediate and the longer term. We are delivering 20,000 additional, modern prison places, the largest prison build programme since the Victorian era. This will ensure the right conditions are in place to rehabilitate prisoners, helping to cut crime and protect the public. As of end of April, we have already delivered around. 3,400 of these additional places, including through the brand-new prison, HMP Five Wells, which opened last year. In addition, HMP Fosse Way will open this year, and construction is well underway on our newest prison HMP Millsike - bringing over 3,000 new prison places between them by 2025. We are undertaking major refurbishments at sites including HMP Birmingham, HMP Liverpool and HMP Norwich, delivering around 800 cells between them. Construction has started on new houseblocks at HMP Stocken, HMP Hatfield, HMP Sudbury and HMP Rye Hill which will add an estimated 850 places between them.

Department for Energy Security and Net Zero

Housing: Insulation

Lord Taylor of Warwick: To ask His Majesty's Government (1) what steps they are taking to increase the rate at which homes are insulated under the Great British Insulation Scheme, and (2) what consideration they have given to placing the targets under the Scheme on a statutory footing.

Lord Callanan: The Great British Insulation Scheme is expected to be established by summer 2023, with obligated energy suppliers able to deliver measures before this, from 30 March 2023, following the publication of the government response to last year’s consultation on scheme design. Yearly targets will be set including minimum levels of delivery, whilst also allowing energy suppliers to deliver more rapidly and have measures counted towards their scheme obligation overall. The Statutory Instrument for the scheme will be laid before Parliament later in spring 2023, putting scheme targets and other requirements on a statutory footing.

Radioactive Materials: Transport

Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick: To ask His Majesty's Government what recent assessment they have made of the regulations governing the transport of nuclear material within the UK.

Lord Callanan: Transport regulations are enforced by expert independent regulators, the Office for Nuclear Regulation in Great Britain and the Northern Ireland Environment Agency in Northern Ireland. The Government invited the International Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA) Integrated Regulatory Review Service (IRRS) mission to assess the UK’s regulatory framework for radiological and nuclear safety in 2019, including for transport. The mission team found that the transport regime met all international standards and did not make any recommendations for improvement.

Nuclear Reactors and Wind Power

Lord Taylor of Warwick: To ask His Majesty's Government whatsteps they are taking to provide an update on their target (1) to increase offshore wind capacity five-fold by 2030, and (2) to approve eight new nuclear reactors.

Lord Callanan: The Government provided an update on the steps being taken to meet its offshore wind ambition in the Powering Up Britain: Energy Security Plan published on 30 March 2023. Actions to increase deployment include a new £160m fund for floating offshore wind and legislation to streamline the consenting process. In Powering Up Britain, the Government launched Great British Nuclear (GBN), which is an arms-length body responsible for driving delivery of new nuclear projects, backed with funding. The first priority for GBN is to launch a competitive process to select the best Small Modular Reactor (SMR) technologies.

Northern Ireland Office

NHS: Drugs

Lord Rogan: To ask His Majesty's Government what plans they haveto reform the Northern Ireland Drug Tariff.

Lord Rogan: To ask His Majesty's Government what progress they have made in implementing theCommunity Pharmacy Commissioning Plan for Northern Ireland.

Lord Caine: The Government is acutely aware of the broader pressures facing health services in Northern Ireland and remains committed to supporting the restoration of the Executive in Northern Ireland as soon as possible. As such, a locally elected, accountable and effective devolved government is, and will remain, the right way to address this issue. The Government stands ready to work with a restored Executive, but we have a responsibility to ensure public services and management of public funds can continue in its absence. As such, the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland has introduced the Northern Ireland (Interim Arrangements) Bill to ensure continued clarity on the powers for Northern Ireland Departments to maintain delivery of public services. This will mean that decisions in crucial areas - such as to ensure the maintenance of public services - can continue to be taken in the absence of an Executive.

Attorney General

Crimes against Humanity: Prosecutions

Lord Alton of Liverpool: To ask His Majesty's Government what consideration they have given to applying universal jurisdiction as a means of bringing to justice those who have committed atrocity crimes, but have evaded prosecution in international courts or domestic courts in other jurisdictions.

Lord Stewart of Dirleton: The International Criminal Court Act 2001 and The International Criminal Court (Scotland) Act 2001 allows jurisdiction over the offences of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity committed abroad by any person who: (i) is/was a UK national or UK resident at the time of the crime; or (ii) became a UK national or UK resident after the crime and still resides in the UK when proceedings are brought. Criminal law in the United Kingdom provides for universal jurisdiction over the crimes of torture and grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions, allowing prosecutorial authorities to investigate and prosecute these offences under certain conditions when they were committed abroad by foreign nationals. The relevant prosecuting authorities from across the UK will bring individuals to justice wherever possible, in line with their respective prosecutorial policies. Universal jurisdiction has been applied in the past in the UK, including in the case against Agnes Taylor who was accused of participating in crimes of torture during the first Liberian Civil War.